Growing Up In The Sixties
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I grew up in the sixties and there were no dishwashers or garbage disposals. The dish washer had two hands and two legs. The garbage disposal was a big rusted can out back.
Dirty dishes and pans and skillets were dealt with at the kitchen sink using two hands and soap. Since three meals a day were cooked, that stacks up to quite a few dishes for two adults and a child.
We ate eggs, bacon, ham, or sausage for breakfast. We never had toast that I recall, but instead there were homemade biscuits rolled out and baked in the oven. And there was always gravy for the biscuits.
I can almost taste that gravy and biscuits today. What they serve in a restaurant doesn’t even come close.
We called the refrigerator the ice box. It was white, and I don’t recall seeing other colors. I never even heard the word “refrigerator” until I was older. It was always “the ice box.”
The only canned food I can recall eating was Spam, which kind of horrifies me now for some reason.
Something I Recall From Watching Old TV Shows:
Heavens, back then all we had was a black and white TV with an antennae that got a few channels. We watched Gunsmoke and Bonanza, and there were several others we watched regularly. All were TV Westerns featuring cowboys and Indians.
Oh, and I forgot “I Love Lucy”, “The Andy Griffith Show” and” Leave It To Beaver.” I watched those shows too. There are probably others that will come to mind later on.
Another thing I recall from watching TV as a child was seeing TV characters sink in quicksand. Or almost sink and someone reached out a hand and saved them.
For some reason there seemed to be quicksand involved in many TV shows. But I don’t think I’ve even heard it mentioned since back then. Being a child, I was afraid I’d be walking along and just step into oblivion and be swallowed up, never to be seen again.
If not quicksand, then a big venomous snake might rattle its way over to me. I feared I’d be bitten, and an anti-venom treatment would have to be located to keep me from dying from a snake bite.
On TV these snakes were always coiled up and hidden, waiting for an innocent hand to reach out or someone to tip over a rock. There that horrid snake would be underneath, hissing and angry.
TV shows were certainly different back then. Have you even seen a TV show where quicksand was involved? I haven’t as an adult that I recall.
Gunsmoke:
Marshall Matt Dillon was the sheriff in Dodge City, Kansas, where he kept law and order on the Western frontier in the late 1800s. The character was played by James Arness. Gunsmoke began in 1955 and ran for 20 seasons. That is almost equal to a lifetime for today’s TV series..
Matt was sweet on Miss Kitty (Amanda Blake), who owned the Long Branch Saloon. Did you know that the sheriff only kissed one woman in the 20-year history of the series, and it was not Miss Kitty.
It was Michael Learned, the actress who later gained fame for her role on “The Waltons”. The kiss came in the episode entitled “Matt’s Love Story” in 1973.
Back then there were no long lingering kisses between romantic couples on Prime Time TV. It would have been too scandalous.
Matt Dillon’s deputy was Marshal Chester Goode (Dennis Weaver). Weaver left Gunsmoke in 1964, and his character was replaced by Festus Haggen (Ken Curtis).
I think of Festus as sort of the equivalent of Andy Griffith’s deputy Barney Fife. Both were bumbling characters who usually had to be rescued from some nitwit thing they got themselves into. Then there was old Doc Adams (Milburn Stone), who played the bespectacled doctor in Dodge City.
Do you remember the beginning of the show where Matt Dillon stands at one end of Dodge City facing off with a guy in a shoot-out?
Arvo Oswald Ojala was a Hollywood technical advisor on the subject of quick-draw with a revolver. He also worked as an actor. And his most famous role was that of the unnamed man shot by Marshal Matt Dillon in the opening sequence.
Bonanza:
Bonanza was NBC’s longest running Western, and the second-longest-running series behind CBS’s Gunsmoke. This show was known for presenting pressing moral dilemmas at the time.
In 2002, Bonanza was ranked #43 on TV Guide’s 50 Greatest TV Shows Of All Time. And in 2013 TV Guide had it slotted in its list of The 60 Greatest Dramas of All Time.
The time setting for Bonanza and the Cartwrights was roughly between 1861, which was Season #1, and 1867, which was Season #13.
There was Ben Cartwright (Lorne Greene), who played the patriarch of an all-male ranching family in Nevada. And Eric “Hoss” Cartwright, (Dan Blocker), Adam Cartwright (Pernell Roberts), and Little Joe (Michael Landon).
Tragically, Michael Landon died of pancreatic cancer in 1991 at the age of 54. He also starred in “Little House On The Prairie” as Charles “Pa” Ingalls from 1974 to 1983. As well as “Highway To Heaven”, where he played a probationary angel.
I can still remember the opening music of the “Bonanza” show after all these years. Dun-diddle-dun-diddle-dun- diddle-dun, diddle-dun-diddle-duh-un.
Recalling The Olden Days:
Oh, isn’t it fun to remember those olden days? When things were simple and there were no computers or cell phones or social media to deal with. People could sit and chat and there were no dings or notification sounds to distract you.
I’m just glad when I raised my girls cell phones hadn’t yet made it onto the scene. If they wanted to speak to someone, they went to see them. Or called them on the house phone that was usually situated on the wall. Now I realize that those growing up years were considered olden days too!
When I was a child I played with dolls or marbles or climbed trees. Most of the time there were no other children around, so I created imaginary friends to play with. Where I grew up we did not have a kindergarten class. You went straight into first grade. But then it was a small town.
Would You Move Back To Your Hometown?
Sometimes I imagine what it would be like to move back there. Many people I grew up with have gone back to live there or have never even left. I find these things out from Facebook, but I never contact them.
It might be interesting to go back there and find a house to live in. Drive down the same streets and park in front of the same downtown stores. I don’t know what’s still there, as I haven’t been back since 1985 or thereabouts.
Occasionally I see childhood friends crop up on Facebook surrounded by their grandchildren. It’s hard to believe that now we’re the grandmothers and the children are generations twice removed.
I have a daughter, Kendra, who will turn 50 in November, and Kasi the same month will turn 46. And they have children. I imagine they look back at their high school years and think of that as their own “olden days.”
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I still live in my “ hometown “ and I feel like I need to get out and see something else and new people and I feel smothered here.
I would not move back to my hometown. It has evolved into an unrecognizable metropolis and I don’t do crowds or heavy traffic. I have one doctor there and grateful I don’t have to see them very often. I live in the country now, nice and peaceful with cows and wonderful neighbors..
My elderly aunt loves Westerns so I watch Gunsmoke with her. We are in the seasons now when Dennis Weaver was on there. I wish we could go back to how TV used to be. I loved the Carol Burnett show, it was hilarious watching Harvey Korman and Tim Conway crack each other up.
You brought me right back into my childhood home with this engaging post! My sisters and I sat mesmerized in front of Lassie every Sunday night, scared to death that she would end up in the quicksand! Whew! It was always her who pulled someone out!
We also loved the Mickey Mouse Show and Annette was my favorite. I wasn’t a fan of westerns but they must have made an impact. My sisters and I would ride pretend horses, giving them names and creating alternate identities for ourselves. Creativity fueled all of our play. None of that is required by kids these days. We played baseball in the backyard with a broomstick for a bat. Hung up a blanket on the clothesline for a stage for our plays. Drew faces of our schoolmates on paper, cut them out, and played teacher. We wrote our own books to stock our check out library, complete with inventory slips. We made paper dolls from Sears catalogs. Dad worked at the post office so we weren’t poor, but it just seemed like we were happy with all of these makeshift toys and lacked for nothing.
Please do a follow up post with more of your memories!
And to add… I think if I could, I would return to “home” if I was alone. I think there’s a lot to be said about that peace if one has it, to return there and enjoy the rest of your life realizing you’ve gone, lived, and returned.
What an interesting post. I often think of the older days – the simplicity of it – yes, before everything dings at you requiring attention. People worked and kept “busy” that way – within the home. Not out and about crazy where their laundry is stacked on couches and down the hall or oodles of dishes sit before throwing them in an overly full dishwasher. It’s sad really. I like housework. I like everything house. I’m glad I have those memories to keep me sane and I just told my husband last week, how sad it is that the young adult generations now will never have those simplistic, quiet memories to hold on to. I try to re-create some of it, but too, we’ve grown accustomed to things perhaps we shouldn’t have.
Wonderful trip down memory lane. I remember all those shows and cartoons on Saturday mornings…Captain Kangeroo and Bozo the Clown, Jackie Gleason (with Ed Norton) and so many others. I wonder what our grandchildren will look back and remember with fondness? Diana
You took me right down the middle of memory lane, Brenda. I grew up in South Texas and carry wonderful memories. We lived with my grandparents because my mother couldn’t seem to stay married. She was meaner than a junk yard dog. They lived in town but had a ranch of their own like so many others back then. Lots of great memories. Every evening my grandmother and I watched TV until the national anthem played and programming was done for the day.
Very similar memories, Brenda. Thank you!!
I was a young girl in the 40’s, and turned 10 years of age in 1950. Still pretty young, but I remember my favorite TV show was Howdy Doody, a puppet with red hair. We didn’t own a TV at home, but used to visit my aunt and Uncle, who lived in the twin cities, St. Paul, and they had a TV. My Mother and I took the Grey Hound bus from home in Wisconsin, several times a year to visit my aunt, who was Mom’s sister.
I remember my aunt always made sure I wouldn’t miss that TV show. I still am still fascinated with puppets today. Memories for sure, and I also remember my aunt taking us shopping, riding on street cars back then. The department stores had “moving stairs” and I thought that was magic. Yep, Escalators, and it was the Saturday before Easter Sunday, and I had my picture taken in the store, sitting on the “big” Easter Rabbits lap. Still have that 7″ x 9′ photo, and I am now 85 years old. What great times they were, growing up. Memories are precious…
Those were the “good old days “ my favorite shows were I Love Lucy, Leave It to Beaver and Happy Days, also Bonanza. Every Saturday night we watched The Lawrence Welk Show. I just came across The Lawrence Welk show last Saturday and enjoyed watching it. There were only two channels 5 and 12 and of course an antenna on the tv or some people called them rabbit ears. I believe it was in the 70’s when we got a colored tv.
Wow, talk about a trip down memory lane! Black and white television in the 1950s, and then one day in the late 1950s or early 1960s Dad brought home a small colored TV – it was like going to the land of Oz to see the color! I remember watching The Ed Sullivan Show, Mitch Miller, Lassie, all the westerns – I even remember some of the theme songs, like “Bronco,” “Wyatt Earp,” “Have Gun Will Travel,” “Wagon Train,” “Raw Hide,” we really had an obsession back in those years with the old west as a nation, didn’t we. I’m old enough to remember “My Little Margie,” and all the black and white movies from the 1930s through the 1950s when movies came out in “Technicolor!” I SO wanted to grow up to be an actress, or a singer on Broadway, or a fabulous dancer from watching all of the great musicials we saw on TV back then – and you didn’t have to pay to rent them! By far my favorite show, however, was “Star Trek” that I watched as a teenager along with “The Monkeys,” “Hullabaloo” and “Shindig.” Watching years of “Perry Mason” steered me toward my nearly 46 years in the legal profession, first as a legal secretary (I was the modern-day version of Della Street, or so I imagined myself) and later as an attorney. Ah yes. These days though, I primarily watch home improvement shows, flipper shows, decorating shows, and for years I’ve repeated watching “Desperate Landscapes” on Discovery+.
As a retired teacher from that time, I would get up and cook breakfast and cover with tin foil and leave on stove… my late husband and kids would get eat and get ready for their day….. after teaching, when I got home, housework and cooking supper every night except Sat…. Remember us watching Lawrence Welk as a family Sat night/ doing popcorn on the stove…. Such fond memories even though it was hard but you just did it… I taught school for 35 years and never regretted it…
I loved those shows! I remember playing outside with my friends. We’d play dolls, jacks, play on the swing set, climb trees, ride bikes, roller skate, and swim in the pool. Those were the good old days for sure. We played outside all day and came home to eat. Lots of sleepovers too. So much fun. I’ve often thought of the house I grew up in. I’d love to go back and walk through it!
Me too with mine!
I like to watch some of those reruns. I Love Lucy was of course a favorite. Must shows had twin beds for married couples and one day my lil granddaughter asked me if I wanted a room like that. Such modesty
I Love Lucy was certainly a favorite of mine!
I’m amazed everyday that I’m old now! I wanted to let you know that I just made the Pumpkin Pecan Cobbler from thatovenfeelin.com that you shared in the beginning of September. When I looked over the recipe I wasn’t sure what it was going to be like – I thought maybe like the filling of a shoofly pie or maybe like an Indian Pudding. It turned out to be kind of cake like with a crunchy topping and a lovely gooey sauce so thank you!
I’m so glad you liked it! I’ll have to make it one of these days.
There were dishwashers and colored appliances (pink, turquoise, etc) in the 50s and 60s.
yes there was brown gold and green too. there was also colored TV.
I guess I just never saw those colors. Now that I think about it though, I’ve seen the colored vintage appliances on one of the YouTube videos I watch.
Well we didn’t have colored TV.